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Tag Archives | Occupy Wall Street

Some are mystified by the concerted government / business attack against Occupy. I wasn’t mystified at all as I was politically active in 1960’s counter-culture and protests. We were monitored then, we are monitored now. Deal with it. It goes with the territory. Seriously.

The FBI labeling Occupy as terrorist is more laughably clueless than anything else and makes me wonder if they are even capable of spotting real terrorists. Governmental overreaction like this almost always happens when anarchists are involved. There’s just something about young male anarchists that gets the government’s panties in a twist. Mention anarchy and the government practically pees on itself in response. They don’t have the same response to hardcore Marxist revolutionaries who are arguably more dangerous since they tend to be better organized but only to anarchists. Which also shows the government doesn’t have much of a clue about what anarchy is.

It was more sophisticated than we had imagined: new documents show that the violent crackdown on Occupy last fall – so mystifying at the time – was not just coordinated at the level of the FBI, the Department of Homeland Security, and local police. The crackdown, which involved, as you may recall, violent arrests, group disruption, canister missiles to the skulls of protesters, people held in handcuffs so tight they were injured, people held in bondage till they were forced to wet or soil themselves –was coordinated with the big banks themselves.

As anyone who ever spent time in Zuccotti Park during the encampment phase of Occupy knows, OWS was in disarray from day one. It continually teetered on the edge of implosion due to conflicting forces within and opposition from police and political forces without.

Organized chaos (or chaotic organization) was always OWS’s calling card and to some degree it succeeded against all odds, and against the predictions of professional pundits. This morning’s blockades were a combination of demonstrators “winging it” and careful planning beforehand among a cadre of local activists who have come to know and trust one another over the battles of the past year.

A foldable version of the map above with a three-day itinerary and detailed explanation of events was handed out at various intersections in the Wall Street area throughout the morning

We have taken our message to the Republican and Democratic National Conventions and gotten positive press coverage for Occupy and #S17, but we’re having an issue with getting back to New York City. Plans for buses fell though and at this point 40-45 people are stuck here in Charlotte, North Carolina. We’re trying to raise funds so the people who came from NYC can get back. Some of the people have court dates that are related to Occupy actions.

The bottom line is we’re stuck in North Carolina unless you donate.

If you can help, please do, and please let others know that we need support via email, Twitter, and Facebook. Click here to donate. Thanks!

New England governors and friends were on their way to a dinner party prior to a conference in Burlington, VT and found the way blocked by pedestrians and protesters. So they did what was only natural and called in the police, with police violence the predictable result.

This happened in Vermont, which is not a state known for big protests or huge overreaction response from police. Yet that’s what happened. Something think Occupy has gone away. It sure hasn’t in Vermont, which is a state that has been libertarian since long before the word was invented. Instead of negotiating with protesters the police arrived in gear more befitting a drug cartel raid than for dealing with peaceful protesters. The level of police violence continues to grow unabated. They apparently view the public as the enemy.

And yes, I have helped organize protests, some of which were huge, where police and organizers did negotiate. They key seems to be size. If there are 100 protesters, police won’t negotiate but they probably will if 100,00 are watching.

The Burlington protesters were perhaps invoking the spirit of the patron saint of Vermont, Ethan Allen.

While watching the news from Spain, I wonder what it would be like to live there now during the global depression and ongoing class war. Or Greece. Or Iceland, or Italy, or Portugal, or any other country threatened with what I call “national devaluation.” I would be angry.

Because I’m not an economist but I can smell a scam. I have studied some difficult subjects but I never dared try the dismal science. I am actually proud to have spent a lifetime ignoring the theories of economists. Years ago I thought I just didn’t understand them, but now I’m starting to think economists are intentional liars rather than just confused and confusing observers of the marketplace. Paid shills whose job is to mystify and distract us while the ultra rich steal what little we have left.

We have all heard reams of economic analysis in the last few years, but of course no one would dare say out loud what is really happening. I’m not an economist – I’m a logician. Let me have a try at it.

Read the whole post by my friend Barry Hyman at Independent Voter Network. Yes, there is a class war going on, and the 1% started it. Barry dissects their scam, how the rest of us are expected to pay for their criminality, excess, and incompetence. Austerity must be the order of the day, they squeal, imposing Draconian measures on us while evading the law, buying politicians, and getting governments to send them trillions. A level playing field? I think not.

As the header image for this blog says, ‘They only call it class war when we fight back.” And fight back we must.